Chapter 1 DUST AND DREAMS.

The Nebraska wind didn't care what kind of day you were having. It came in hard and fast across Flynn's Creek, slamming through the flat fields like it had something to prove. Dust flew everywhere, coating the old-looking houses, piling in the corners of windows, sneaking between your teeth if you dared breathe with your mouth open.

Ken Miller spit out of the side of his mouth and wiped the back of his hand across his sweat-looking face. He was just Sixteen years old, but already twice his age, he murmured as he yanked on a rusted bolt stuck deep in the guts of an old John Deere.

"Stubborn as a mule in mud," he muttered, bracing one boot against the tire.

The tractor had been throwing tantrums all summer, and this morning was no different. His dad had tried fixing it first, cussing and sweating until the heat finally drove him off to check the irrigation pump on the far forty. That left Ken here alone, sunburned, and losing a fight to a machine that had seen better decades.

The wrench slipped again, and Ken nearly fell backward.

Then a voice called out behind him, warm and teasing.

"Maybe if you stopped wrestling it like a grizzly and used a little finesse?"

He didn't even need to turn around to know who it was. It was Sharon Hayes.

She stood there with a dusty textbook tucked under one arm, the tail end of a braid already loosened over her shoulder, bits of hair curling free in the wind. Her T-shirt had smudges of grease and dust, and her sneakers looked like they hadn't been white in a year, But her eyes-brown, sharp, amused, were what got him every time.

Ken stood and wiped his hands on his jeans. "Finesse doesn't work on this bolt. It only understands brute force and swearing, and I'm fresh out of both."

Sharon laughed, a sound that somehow cut through the droning cicadas and the constant low hum of summer worry. She dropped the textbook on a patch of grass by the barn door and walked over.

"Move over, Hercules," she said, nudging him aside like it was nothing.

She leaned over the engine, examining the oily mess. Then her eyes scanned the ground until she spotted a lonh old pipe near the woodpile. She picked it up, shook off the dirt, and slid it over the wrench.

"Leverage," she said simply. "Now try."

Ken hesitated, then wrapped his hands around the pipe and pulled. The bolt groaned like something alive. He pulled harder, feeling the strain in his shoulders and back.

Then-CRACK!

The bolt didn't just loosen, It snapped clean off.

Ken went tumbling backward, landing on his backside in a cloud of dust. Sharon jumped back, then burst out laughing.

"Leverage!" she crowed, standing over him with her hands on her hips like she'd just won a trophy. "See? Physics isn't just for passing notes in class."

Ken looked up at her. The sun was behind her head, casting a golden haze through the dust. For a second, she looked like something unreal, some kind of spirit sent to rescue him from the ache of this day. He scrambled up, brushing himself off.

"Alright, Einstein, Point taken. You saved my bacon again."

Sharon picked up her book and gave him a half-smile. "Somebody's gotta keep you from breaking every piece of equipment on this farm."

Her smile faded a little. "How's it going, really?"

Ken's grin dropped. He looked down at the broken bolt on the ground, then at the tractor behind them. His chest felt tight again.

"Same as always," he said. "Barely holding together, Corn prices are garbage, Loan payment's coming up. Ma's working extra shifts cleaning out by the highway; And this thing..." He motioned to the tractor. "This thing's eating money faster than we can make it."

He wasn't crying, He wouldn't cry, But it was like there was a stone sitting behind his ribs that wouldn't move.

Sharon stepped closer. Her face was softer now, no teasing, just quiet understanding. Her hand touched his forearm, warm despite the dust between them.

"My mom sold her best wrapper last year," she said. "Blue and gold, the one she loved, Just to pay for my lab fees and the yearbook. And Pa, he works on machines in three counties just to make rent."

Ken looked at her. "Why do they even bother?"

"Because it's yours, Ken," she said, her voice low and steady. "This farm, This life, It's your family's, Your dad's killing himself to hold onto it for you."

They both looked out at the rows of corn, bending slightly in the wind like tired men.

"My folks are killing themselves for my future," she added. "Your dad's fighting for what's already here."

They stood like that for a moment, side by side, in the shade of a half-dead tractor and a sky too wide to hold.

"What would I do without you, Shari Hayes?" Ken asked, his voice half a whisper.

She smiled, but there was something tender behind it now. "You'd probably still be fighting that bolt, or broken the whole engine by now."

---

That evening, they walked, Same dirt path, same quiet fields, same destination-Lovers' Ridge. It wasn't much of a ridge, just a hill with a crooked old tree, but from up there, you could see afar. The sun lowered, turning the sky orange and purple. They sat in the grass, close enough that their shoulders touched.

Ken looked up at the stars starting to poke through.

"Where do you think we'll be in ten years?" he asked.

Sharon rested her head on his shoulder. "Not here, Or... not just here. I want to see the world, Ken. Cities, People, Languages I don't understand yet. I want more."

She paused. "But I want to come back, too. To this sky, To this place, To you."

Ken wrapped an arm around her. "So... future governor Hayes?"

She laughed, the sound soft and bright. "Maybe, Or engineer, Or school principal, just something better."

She looked at him, "And Ken Miller?"

He shrugged. "Still here, maybe. Smarter farming, A better tractor, House over there by the fence line, Big porch, Some dogs, Maybe... a kid or two."

Sharon blushed. "Kids?"

He smiled. "Yeah. If you're around to keep me from screwing it all up."

They talked about colleges-hers, if she got the scholarships, and about his idea for drought-resistant soybeans. They talked about the world being unfair, and about trying anyway. They talked about what it might feel like to make it someday.

Before they left, he brushed her jaw with his thumb and said, "No matter what happens, we face it together, okay?"

Sharon looked into his eyes, and in the fading light, she nodded. "Always, together."

Their kiss wasn't fireworks, It wasn't loud or dramatic. It was quiet, certain, and full of everything they hadn't said out loud yet, It was a promise.

---

The walk home was slow and soft. But the moment Ken stepped into his house, the weight hit him again. His mom was washing dishes looking tired. His dad was at the table, gazing at a magazine.

The joy from the ridge vanished in the thick air of the kitchen.

"Tractor's fixed," Ken said. "Sharon helped."

Tom nodded. "Good girl."

Then came the sigh, and the words Ken didn't want to hear. "West field pump's gone, need a new bearing, gonna cost."

Ken just nodded, then climbed the stairs to his small room. It was hot and still. He lay on his bed, staring at the ceiling, holding onto the feeling of her lips, of the stars, of that hope,

Until a sound ripped through the silence.

A low, rumbling growl. Then a flash of a strange, green light.

He bolted his door and rushed to the window.

The horizon was on fire with lightning. Clouds like bruises boiled in the sky. Then came the wind; Real Angry, screaming, violent Wind.

"PA!" he shouted, "MA! STORM!"

The nightmare had arrived.